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Elite Wheels / Aliexpress / Trace Velo Been lurking here for several months as I am a new cyclist with sticker shock on carbon road bikes here in the US which led me down the rabbit hole of Chinese frames and building my own. Finding this forum and seeing several channels on Youtube that are dedicated to the Chinese parts I want to give it a try on building my own. I have been making some purchases and starting to gather parts. Having watched Trace Velo on Youtube I purchased off Aliexpress the Sensah team pro shifters to be used witha Shimano 105 groupset along with some Junitech f1 brakes. It's taken a turn for the worse with the Elite Wheels purchase he recommends.

On his videos he claims he's not sponsored by these companies and he gives his "truthful" reviews. Looked legitimate to me as I have seen some of his videos he did give negatives on some of the Chinese products. With the Elite Wheels ENT set getting solid reviews by him and people in his video's comment section I gave them a look on Aliexpress. They had hundreds of good reviews so I went ahead and made an order with upgraded xray spokes for a total of $500. Fast forward months later the mangled Elite Wheel box showed up on my porch. The hubs were sticking out of the box on both sides. I opened it up to find many broken spokes and some badly damaged wheels. Needless to say they were paper weights at that point. Contacted Elite Wheels through Aliexpress and they said Aliexpress is responsible for all shipping so start a dispute. Once the dispute was started Elite Wheel denied the claim so it went to Aliexpress for decision. Aliexpress offered $100 refund. Of course this was not acceptable so at this point I started a chargeback through paypal. Come to find out Aliexpress bans you for this.

So with this bad experience going down I left a comment on Trace Velo's video on these wheels kinda as a heads up to potential buyers. That was yesterday. I woke up this morning and checked to see if I needed to reply to anyone and to my surprise the comment had been deleted. I posted another comment and added that I am going to post on here to let people know Trace Velo is deleting negative comments on these Chinese companies that he is supposedly not sponsored by. It was deleted in less than 2 minutes. Now I am not the brightest bulb in the pack but for a person to claim they are giving honest reviews and are not sponsored by the company to turn around and have a negative comment deleted in less than 2 minutes speaks volumes to me. With the above said I do have a screen shot of what I posted. I can post it if that would help. I am more concerned with people knowing which youtubers and forums are legitimate advice to listen to and spend their hard earned money accordingly and who is just making content to make money off people.

Needless to say I am still in need of wheels. I am wanting 700c 50mm deep by 25mm wide carbon wheels. It looks like I most likely will have several xray spokes after the Elite Wheel fiasco so I am not afraid to purchase more spokes and hubs to put something together. What are some recommended brands to go with for wheels? What places are legitimate to purchase from? I am also very interested in the Carbonda CFR1056 frame. Is that frame worth buying over a good aluminum frame with a lifetime warranty stateside for about the same price?

Wish my first post here was more positive but if my situation can help save just one person the headache I went through it was worth it.

Thanks,
Kyle
October 30, 2022, 09:09:53 AM 		1
Re: Elite Wheels / Aliexpress / Trace Velo Haven't gotten my money back yet... The wheels are shot. They are bent pretty bad. My comment was letting others know Elite Wheels will simply wipe their hands with a customer after they send the product on Aliexpress when it comes to shipping damage and how Aliexpress will try and rip you off on a low ball compensation offer. That is on his video of the ENT Elite Wheels on Aliexpress which are the the exact ones I followed his advice on and purchased. Nothing more nothing less. I'm just the random average person he is making videos for and wanted to share my bad experience on the exact product he's making a video on that helped make my decision to spend my hard earned money on it. He comes off as he is trying to help the community and deleting comments such as mine is sheltering poor practices from both Elite Wheels and Aliexpress on the exact products he's promoting as a "non sponsor" knowing darn well what he is saying is helping drive people to buy said items.

As for the frame I am really interested in the Carbonda CFR1056. Being new to cycling I have a local bike shop here that I met the owner on one of our local trails. Really nice guy and have done some group rides with him. I'm on a Trek FX2 and looking to get into a drop bar endurance road bike which he is a Marin, Fuji, and Cervelo dealer and has given me some options/pricing. He has stressed to me that the last few Chinese carbon frames he has worked on for customers have been so bad that he will not put them together for customers anymore. He is willing to take a brand new Marin Gestalt 1 and strip it down and sell me the frame so I can build it with what I want for about the same money the Carbonda CFR1056 cost me to get to the States. That frame would be aluminum and have a lifetime warranty. Geometry is close to the Carbonda CFR1056.

The damage from shipping is unfortunate but how it was handled help reinforce how difficult it is to deal with Chinese companies on items with issues. My local bike shop guy isn't pushy or trying to just get a sale but was more concerned for my safety and ending up with a problem bike. That also is making it hard for me to take the risk on spending close to 1k on a Chinese carbon frame to my door.  I've seen several posts on here about Carbonda being one of the better Chinese companies which is great but just as you said you had great experiences with Elite Wheels directly on their site and they dropped the ball and left me out to dry on Aliexpress.
October 30, 2022, 12:45:40 PM 		1
Re: Elite Wheels / Aliexpress / Trace Velo Me stating my experience is childish and "burning" an influencer? The guy is on a thin line? What are you even talking about. Trace velo deleted my comments why would I even ask him to reach out to Elite Wheels or Aliexpress to help me. He states he isn't sponsored by them so that would make zero sense to do any ways. He isn't an influencer he is a guy doing reviews on youtube or so he states. That's a big difference from an influencer who is sponsored by a company. You even said yourself the guy helped get you into Chinese parts so saying it's childish in 2022 to blame the internet for introducing me to a product or service is mind boggling. What do you think even this forum is doing. You make no sense.

I never once blamed Trace Velo for the shipping issue. You keep saying that but show me in this thread where I have done that. That would make zero sense as he has nothing to do with the shipping. I simply stated the guy is deleting negative comments towards the companies/aliexpress that he's slinging on youtube. Trace Velo comes off as an average guy buying cheap Chinese parts off Aliexpress with his own money and not being supported by said companies. He says that as it lends more credit to him giving an "honest" review. The fact he has deleted my comment in this situation not once but twice should be more than enough for people to "question" his whole content online where he states he wasn't sponsored. You can't have it both ways. Your either the unaffiliated guy slinging your own money giving honest reviews or the influencer having products pushed your way and letting people know your content is biased. Trying to act like the unaffiliated guy while also trying to make that money as an influencer is a scum bag move as people value the unaffiliated guy more than an "influencer" and Trace knows that. That's my problem with the guy. It's that simple.

At this point you still have provided zero usefulness in this thread or situation. What is your deal? Do you have a connection to Trace Velo and are upset I am exposing his shady actions in this situation? Are you in some way affiliated with Aliexpress or Elite Wheels? If this happened to you wouldn't you want to share your experience with this community to try and help others not have to deal with this situation?

November 05, 2022, 10:35:01 PM 		1